


These Doomed Pathways We Walk - Dave Strider

by farfromgraceful



Series: These Doomed Pathways We Walk [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Blood, Death, Doomed Timelines, Other, SBURB, Suicide, Swords, i had to to tag that twice because there is so much blood, lots of blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-28
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-19 01:48:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2369939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/farfromgraceful/pseuds/farfromgraceful
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Time has finally run out for your doomed timeline and it's no longer being held together by anything more than your desperation. You know it's hopeless, you know it inevitable, but goddamn, you are the Knight of Time and you're not going out without destroying the game that stole your friends from you, and left you standing along in a puddle of their blood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	These Doomed Pathways We Walk - Dave Strider

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a little thing I wrote to make a friend cry. Technically it's my first Homestuck fanfic, so you know, tell me what you think if you want more.

**Be Dave Strider == >**

 

You clutched desperately at the rapidly unraveling timeline as it slid through your fingers like sand. Tears bubbled, hot and fast, obscuring your vision and blurring the scene that was layed out before you. Beyond caring that your coolkid facade had cracked enough to show the scared little boy beneath, you let the tears slide down your bloodless cheeks from beneath your shattered shades. It was all over  
All of it.   
There was no resetting the game. There was never a reset button to begin with. There was no going back. No going forward. There was no past or future and the present was only hanging on in the eye of the storm as all of reality crumbled around it. You knew all of this. You knew it because time itself flowed through your veins, it moved through your entire body with every terrified beat of your fluttering heart. But there was no beat now. No constant tick-tock as your body kept track of the time that pushed you further into the future every second. Nothing at all. Everything simply ceased to exist outside the single moment you had frozen in your blind panic.   
John was laying on his back, his crayola-blue eyes staring emptily up at the clouds above. The blue of his stupid hood marred by the blackening blood that was pooled around his fragile body.   
Rose was elegant, even in death, spread out like she was to be crucified. Purple eyes wide open and wet with tears that would never be shed. Her porcelain skin smudged with black lipstick and red blood spatters. Thick blood trickled across the unforgiving ground to mingle with John's.  
Jade was curled around a sword a few meters away, her leaf green eyes closed to the world. The handle the only part of the weapon visible as she lay on her side like she could be sleeping. Like you could just wake her if you touched her tiny shoulder.  
There was nothing Just or Heroic about these deaths, you thought, they were simply unwarranted and horrific. But they had been planning to reset the game, rewind right back before any of this happened, and apparently the game did not want to start from scratch. It could, and it would, salvage what was to be found in the smoldering and bloodstained remnants of your current game. In this timeline, this doomed timeline, their actions had been just enough to count John, Rose, and Jade's deaths as heroic.   
You could see it now.   
In another timeline together you would have continued your quest. You would have found that reset button, the right strand of data to start this all again, you would have succeeded where others had failed and you would have fixed everything.  
But there would be no more fixing this timeline.  
No more meddling could bend it back to the Alpha timeline.  
No salvation that would save it from it's inevitable destruction.  
You felt the last seconds of the universe trickled out of your grasp. Your hair floating in the wake of a frozen wind, your hands shaking as you strained to hold your timetables in place while the game tried to pry the last threads of the timeline from your grip. But you were the Knight of Time and you weren't going down without a fight. If you couldn't save the timeline, if you couldn't save your friends, you would destroy the thing that took them from you. A billion million timelines were running through you and you were going to tear them all apart. Your fingers shook with the effort of holding your timetables in place, but you sucked in a shuddering breath and with one smooth movement you pulled your broken sword from your strife specibus, driving the jagged end through both the timetables at once.   
And everything shattered.   
You could feel the timelines unraveling like the friendship bracelet John had once made you. You'd worn it for years, ironically of course, and eventually it had snapped off during a strife with your Bro. It was the first time you'd ever forfeited a strife, but your Bro had just watched on silently as you had tried to tie it back together and the thin band had simply unraveled even more. The strands of the timelines fell apart, no longer held together by the time you wielded. A small whimper escaped your mouth as you thought of all the lives you'd just ended. All the John's and Rose's and Jade's you'd just wiped off the face of this universe. Despite this knowledge, you managed only work up an echo of real grief for them, they had never been  _your_  John, or  _your_  Rose, they'd never truly be  _your_  Jade. All the others would never be more than ghosts to you, doubles of the people you loved most, ghosts that were only chosen to continue existing because the game had approved of their decisions so far. You had never really killed them, you reminded yourself as you looked down at the frozen scene still layed out beneath you. You had just deleted data from after a certain save point. Those timelines had never existed. None of those ghosts had been created, they hadn't yet played the game, they still had an opportunity to do things differently. Dying was a lot different to not existing, and you'd made sure to destroy all the timelines within the game. Outside of the game though, you had no control over time, so the universe, as it was before Sburb, was safe.   
Somewhere, you were probably whining about something as trivial as your Bro buying orange juice instead of apple. Your records spinning endlessly on turntables that were just regular turntables.  
Somewhere, John would be eating a home baked cake and watching a movie with his Dad. His whole house would be filled with the stick sweet scent of freshly baked goods.  
Somewhere, Rose was knitting some monstrosity, while making passive aggressive comments as she watched her Mom down another cocktail. Maybe, one day, she'd finally finishing writing that wizard fanfic of hers.  
And somewhere, back in a much younger universe, Jade would have been tending to her garden, chatting happily to Bec. Her garden blooming to life around her.  
And you still were here.  
An echo.  
A ghost.   
No more than a strand of data.   
With a silent clang, your sword slipped from between your trembling fingers and fell to the ground. You landed. Standing on the black and white planet, you knelt over John first.   
You closed his eyes and slipped his cracked glasses back on to his nose. His freckles were more noticeable when he wasn't blushing. You realised he would never blush again. You'd never again hear him snort in laughter when your metaphors got away from you.  
Then you moved over to Rose.  
You pushed her bangs out of her eyes, before closing them too. Then you placed her trademark pink headband back on to her head. You wiped the black smear of lipstick from her cheek. She would have hated to have her lipstick in such a mess and you realised you'd never hear her lecture you about your entirely plausible mental complexes again.  
Last was Jade.  
You straightened her glasses and pushed a stray lock of thick black hair behind her ear. Her bloodless lips seemed turned up at the corners, like an echo of a once brilliant smile. You missed her nerdy giggle already. Your chest ached to think she'd never laugh at your jokes again.   
You stood among the fallen bodies of your friends, picking up your fallen sword and you cast one last look around. There was so much blood. As you drove your own broken sword through your shattered heart, your blood joined the theirs.

  
Your form flickered. 

  
And then you were restored.  
Suicide wasn't Just and it definitely wasn't Heroic.   
And the game had brought you back again.  
You slammed your sword into your stomach this time. Blood bubbled in your mouth as you fell down beside your friends once more.  
You flickered back into existence for the second time.  
Again, and again, and again, you drove your broken sword into your chest.  
Again, and again, and again, you felt your ribs crack, your lungs burst, your heart stop beating.   
And every time you stood back up for another try.  
Your clothes were in tatters, your shades long abandoned at your blood soaked feet, your white blonde hair dripping in your own crimson blood.

  
And you stood up again.


End file.
